Level 7

derive some satisfaction from the fact that, judging by our lower level, we are rated as more important than our country’s elite.

“Of course,” he said, “this doesn’t mean we’d have been above all those politicians and ex-generals and so on if all of us had stayed on the surface. But our military function makes it necessary for us to be given the most privileged position down here. The final victory—which means their welfare as well as ours—depends on us.”

What X-107 had said made me think of the position of the captain on a big liner. Though some of his passengers may be eminent scientists or important statesmen, men of far more consequence, it is the captain who usually has the best-situated cabin. Of course, the importance of Level 7, or even Level 6, relative to Level 5 is far greater than that of a captain to his passengers.

“I imagine,” I said, “that the people of Level 5—who include our policy-makers, after all—would have put themselves on Levels 6 and 7 and us on Level 5 if there had been enough room for them down here. But they must have decided that getting a large number of themselves sheltered on a fairly deep level was better than having too few of them on Levels 6 and 7.”

X-107 thought not. He said that whatever size the various levels had been, we should still have been allocated space on the deepest one because of our job.

Well, for one reason or another, the armed forces now find themselves in the safest place in the world, not in the front lines. Quite a change from the days when a soldier had to advance into a machine-gun volley and a pilot was forever expecting something to blast him out of the sky. Today we, the soldiers of our country, are shielded by an earth crust 3,000 or 4,400 feet thick. No warrior’s armour-plating ever compared with that.

For once let the civilians tremble while the soldiers feel secure.

MAY 20

Levels 4 and 3 are designed on the same principle as Level 5. They have similar equipment and they are to house important people—though not so important as the elite of Level 5. The higher the level, once you get above the military units, the lower the social status of its prospective inhabitants.

Level 4 is sub-divided into ten independent and self-sufficient units, each holding 10,000 people. They are dispersed throughout the country, about 1,000 feet deep, and their food and energy supplies are planned to last about a century.

Level 3 is higher, about 500 feet deep, and has twenty-five units which will contain 20,000 persons each. So it will shelter in all half a million people. It has enough food and energy for about twenty-five years only.

The construction of Level 3 was in a way a harder task than that of Levels 4 and 5, simply because of the size of the units. Each must contain everything necessary for the life of 20,000 people, and though they will be more crowded and less convenient to live in than the units of Levels 4 and 5, not to mention Levels 6 and 7, the sheer magnitude of the building operation gave the designers some severe headaches.

Incidentally, the analogy of a ship was used by today’s speaker, though rather differently from the way I used it. Levels 5, 4 and 3 correspond, according to him, to the first, second and third classes on a boat. Each is bigger than the preceding one and accommodates more passengers; and it is not quite as comfortable or well equipped.

I am sure the speaker was understating the facts. If he had to use a naval analogy, it would have been nearer the mark to compare Level 5 to the cheapest third-class berths, Level 4 to the deck of an immigrant ship, and Level 3 to the hold of a cattle boat or one of those hulks sailed by the old slave-traders. To start with first class was ridiculous. Even we. Level 7 personnel are no more comfortable, by and large, than tourist-class passengers on a not very luxurious ship.

Besides, the analogy breaks down, as most analogies seem to below ground, unless you turn one half of it on its head. Whoever heard of a ship with the very best cabins at the bottom of the hold?

MAY 21

The talks about the different levels still hold their fascination for me. P cannot understand why, and it is useless trying to discuss such things with her. X-107 is the right sort of person for that—he always has been—and I am really lucky to have him as my room-mate.

The talks have tended to dwell on the differences between Levels 5, 4 and 3, which makes one forget that, in a sense, they form one very distinct group. I was reminded of the fact by X-107, who pointed out not only the similarity of their equipment and facilities, but also their basic social unity. “Despite the distinctions you may make between the elite of 20,000, the group of 100,000 and the mass of half a million people,” he said, “they add up to only 620,000. This sounds a lot if you think of the difficulty of housing them all underground, but very few if you remember the size of the nation.”

He was perfectly right. With a nine-figure population to take into consideration, 620,000 is a mere drop in the bucket.

“So,” he went on, “to be picked for these levels is a real privilege. To be included in Levels 3 and 4, let alone Level 5, you’d have to belong to the pick of society—or else be married to the right person or have the right parents. Then if people are going to bring their families down with them, I suppose they’ll want to stay together and live something like a normal civilian life.” X-107 shook his head doubtfully. “That’s not nearly as orderly and rational as our system. I’m sure there will be awful complications.”

I smiled at his seriousness and said, with some mischief: “But what will an elite do when it’s all on its own. If an elite hasn’t a crowd to contrast itself with, what will happen to it? I think living by themselves may prove hard for our select civilians—and not only the honoured few on Level 5.”

X-107 thought this might indeed be an interesting sociological problem. He suggested that, under the pressure of seclusion, each group would develop new fine grades of social distinction within itself, so that before long each underground unit would form a little social pyramid of its own.

I found this idea fascinating. “Who do you think would come out on the very top in a cave of, say, 5,000 top people?” I asked. “It couldn’t be the statesmen, because down here there won’t be much in the way of international politics.”

X-107 disagreed: he thought that international matters could be negotiated from the caves by means of radio.

“Even if that’s so,” I retorted, “they won’t have so much national politics to talk about. There will surely be very little going on the international sphere after an atomic war. Radioactivity will keep everybody below ground for a long time, and they won’t have a chance to build more atomic rockets to replace the ones we’ve fired. No more rockets, no more wars. There will be no point in making alliances either. No alliances, no wars—politics won’t be politics any more.”

“There’s still something else they can do,” X-107 replied a little wistfully. “They can abuse each other over the radio.”

“If they’re not too busy washing their grandchildren’s diapers,” I added.

This made X-107 laugh. “Maybe this will be the new social yardstick on the civilian levels,” he said. “The person who proves to be most useful, best adjusted, cleverest at improvising things and solving day-to-day problems—he’ll rise in status. The rest will go down.”

“Not down,” I replied jokingly. “To be down is the greatest privilege. Look at us!”

MAY 22

Today P persuaded me to join her again in the little room in the psychology department, as we both